Mapleson are
counselling together. I think he furnishes Tell with some booty, for
Tell is inordinately prosperous. I look at this from a lawyer's place.
You have grown up with the crowd here, and you see as a young man from
the social side, where personal motives count for much. Together we must
get this thing unravelled; and it may be in doing it some love matters
and some church matters may get mixed and need straightening. You must
keep me informed of every thing you know." He paused a moment, then
added: "I am glad you have let me know how it is with you, Phil. In your
life I can live my own again. Children do so bless us. Be happy in your
love, my boy. But be manly, too. There are some hard climbs before you
yet. Learn to bear and wait. Yours is an open sunlit way to-day. If the
shadows creep across it, be strong. They will lift again. Run home now
and tell Aunt Candace I'll be home at one o'clock. Tell her what you
have told me, too. She will be glad to know it."

"She does know it; she has known it ever since the night we came into
Springvale in 1854."

My father turned to the door. Then he put his arms about me and kissed
my forehead. "You have your mother's face, Phil." How full of tenderness
his tones were!

In the office I saw Judson moving restlessly before the windows. He had
been waiting there for some time, and he frowned on me as I passed him.
He was a man of small calibre. His one gift was that of money-getting.

By the careful management of the Whately store in the owner's absence he
began to add to his own bank account. With the death of Mr. Whately he
had assumed control, refusing to allow any investigation of affairs
until, to put it briefly, he was now in entire possession. Poor Mrs.
Whately hardly knew what was her own, while her husband's former clerk
waxed pompous and well-to-do. Being a vain man, he thought the best
should come to him in social affairs, and being a man of medium
intellect, he lacked self-control and tact.

This was the nature of the creature who strode into Judge Baronet's
private office, slamming the door behind him and presenting himself
unannounced. The windows front the street leading down to where the
trail crossed the river, and give a view of the glistening Neosho
winding down the valley. My father was standing by one of these windows
when Judson fired himself into the room. John Baronet's mind was not on
Springvale, nor on the river. His thoughts were of his son a